A Philosophical Snack I Just Noticed
I've got a slogan for them: "The best of all possible crackers!" How can they miss?
Labels: humor and whimsy
posted by Cowboy Dave Dickerson | 2:03 PM
Bourbon Cowboy
The adventures of an urbane bar-hopping transplant to New York.
About Me
- Name: Cowboy Dave Dickerson
- Location: New York, New York, United States
I'm a storyteller in the New York area who is a regular on NPR's "This American Life" and at shows around the city. Moved to New York in 2006 and am working on selling a memoir of my years as a greeting card writer, and (as a personal, noncommercial obsession) a nonfiction book called "How to Love God Without Being a Jerk." My agent is Adam Chromy at Artists and Artisans. If you came here after hearing about my book on "This American Life" and Googling my name, the "How to Love God" book itself isn't in print yet, and may not even see print in its current form (I'm focusing on humorous memoir), but here's a sample I've posted in case you're curious anyway: Sample How To Love God Introduction, Pt. 1 of 3. Or just look through the archives for September 18, 2007.) The book you should be expecting is the greeting card book, about which more information is pending. Keep checking back!
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Saturday, March 01, 2008
4 Comments:
Okay, I admit I don't get this one. It looks more like a Scrabble tile draw. Hint?
Sorry. Leibniz was a philosopher who is famous for his philosophical optimism, and his most famous quote is probably "This is the best of all possible worlds." (I'm not an expert, but I assume he derived this from some extension of the categorical imperative: We can imagine a perfect being; a perfect being must exist, since one that didn't exist would be imperfect; such a being would, ipso facto, create the best possible world; the end.) He's sent up mercilessly in Voltaire's Candide, which is one of the most wicked satires in history. If you haven't read it, treat yourself to it. On top of everything else, it's incredibly short.
His other idea, by the way, was that the world was made of basic particles he called "monads." And he has another famous saying, "The monads have no windows," which I'm not sure what it means. It does, however, lead to one of my favorite quotes from a Woody Allen essay on philosophy. In talking about the idea of a basic particle, Woody writes, "Leibniz called them monads. Democritus called them atoms. Fortunately the two men never met, or there would have been a very dull argument."
Good quote by Woody Allen, there.
I've read Voltaire, and I remember Pangloss lived by the belief that this is "the best of all possible worlds." I guess I'd forgotten the Leibniz reference. It's been about 15 years since I read it, though, and I most definitely don't have the brain for memory that you do. ;)
An optimist (such as Leibniz) believes we live in the best of all possible worlds.
A pessimist fears this is true....
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